While it was always within the power of former Governor (now Senator) Rick Scott to remove the incompetent sheriff, Scott never had the political courage to do that. Not even after the release of the scathing Parkland Commission report.

But today, Ron DeSantis was sworn in as the new governor of the Sunshine State. And what a difference a change of occupants in the top office makes. According to the Miami New Times:

Broward Sheriff Scott Israel has informed numerous high-ranking BSO members that he expects to be removed from his position and will fight to get his job back, according to three sources close to the agency.

The jaw-droppingly ineffectual Israel isn’t going quietly.

As Ron DeSantis prepares to be sworn in as Florida’s governor today, those sources say Israel has been bracing for his removal and has told underlings he will appeal it, a move that will likely lead to a trial in the Florida Senate.

This from a cop who’s done nothing but try to deflect blame (onto underlings, the NRA, anyone he could think of) for his own mistakes and was happy to tell anyone who would listen what a wonderful job he’s done.

After the shooting, Israel wrote in a letter to Gov. Rick Scott that BSO school resource officer Scott Peterson, who was allowed to resign after the shooting, was the only deputy at Stoneman Douglas while shots were being fired. A simple check of radio transmissions, however, showed several deputies responding to the school failed to go inside while gunshots sounded.

At the same time, Israel touted his own “amazing leadership” and compared himself to a general who is not responsible for the actions of individual soldiers.

So much for ‘the buck stops here.’

Israel’s removal would be only the beginning, says Deputy Jeff Bell, the BSO union chief and member of DeSantis’ transition team. The move “would remove an incompetent sheriff,” Bell says. “But if you’re looking to fix the agency and put it on the right track, it does nothing to do that.”

He says Israel’s numerous imported cronies and political hires need to be swept out, a sentiment echoed by retired BSO Sgt. Willie Jones, who finished second to Israel in the 2016 Democratic primary. “Top administrators must be looked at real quickly and very closely,” says Jones, who plans to run again in 2020. “You must restore the trust to the community to know that the sheriff’s office is going to do the things they need to do to make them safe.”

My guess is the governor would replace him until the next election. Beyond Israel’s incompetence is his corruption. He hired a TON of political supporters to crony jobs, has put his face on the side of sherriff’s offices cars right before the election, etc. He’s as corrupt as a chicago politician.

“That’s going to be a tough row to hoe” only because this idiot is “a tough hoe to row.” He has been sucking at the public teat for so long he has to fight because he will starve without it. I mean, who else would hire this crowing cock?

If he was even a little smart he wouldn’t fight it. He’d present it as a partisan attack by a gun toting radical against his reasonable and family-friendly anti gun values and kick off his pure political career as a pariah arm in arm with Bloomberg.

Thankfully these idiots honestly think they can do no wrong and love to flail about psychotically while falling on their own swords repeatedly.

First and foremost the blame needs to be placed on the Supreme Court for ruling law enforcement has no duty to protect the individual(s). Second the sheriff and his deputies need to be blamed for taking that ruling to heart. Second a General is responsible for his soldiers actions by vicarious liability. The thing is in the military shit rolls down hill if it goes up the chain that far. Usually though so subordinate officers don’t put their meat on the chopping block they handle it before it gets that far. Unfortunately for the sheriff he is also the subordinate officer in this case except for maybe his under sheriff. It was also the sheriff’s call for his deputies to not charge towards the gunfire. He should be shit canned and not allowed to work in public service where public safety would be a responsibility.

Roger, I agree with the Supreme Court, and further, I have no interest whatsoever in paying for enough LEOs to provide personal protection for every individual in the country, particularly because that is the responsibility of each individual, not *me*. If people ever got the idea that it was their own responsibility to take care of their own business, be it health care, grocery bills, violent assault, or oppressive government, it would take a matter of weeks to return the nation to a semblance of sanity. Complaining that government is not taking care of us well enough is counterproductive.

Firing Sheriff Israel should be just the first step. The second step should be prosecuting him for accessory to murder.

Why is Sheriff Israel an accessory to murder you ask? Because he coerced parents and school staff to be unarmed and refused to intervene after they were defenseless and an attacker began to maim and murder.

Note: someone who promises to provide security and will actually deliver on that promise nevertheless has no righteous authority to force people in their care to disarm, although it is more palatable. What is utterly not palatable, though, is promising to provide security, forcing the people in your care to disarm (turn over their security to you), and then failing to provide their security.

The 4 stars on his collar say everything about his bloated ego and why he should have been removed the day the tragedy happened. I get that law enforcement is a paramilitary occupation (arguable how far it should be taken) but an elected official is NOT a 4 star general, and when he thinks he is, it’s past time that he is gone. And as others have noted, if he were a 4 star general, he might well be gone by now.

All the cops who were armed, on campus and did not enter the school are COWARDS. You let those children die to preserve your own lives. Being paid to protect and serve and not even coming close. Cops should have to pass a ‘do you have a set of balls test’ since its obvious the broward country sheriffs office doesn’t have a full set of nuts between all of them.

I would also support firing all school staff (teachers, admin, cooks, janitors) who did not run to the sound of the guns. They shared in the responsibility to protect those children, and hid from it, apparently except one.

I see a similar pattern regarding the Rodney King riots in the ’90s. LAPD and politicians told L.A. citizens they didn’t need a gun because they had the LAPD. When the rioting got rolling, the police fled the city like mice and hid for a week, abandoning the citizens to the mercy of the thugs. The police guarded city officials and their families, water and power facilities, and largely hunkered down in precinct stations with families.
Same pattern at Columbine High. Police hid behind fire trucks for four hours with all their cool tactical gear before tip-toeing inside. Most victims would have survived had teams entered the building right away.
Salt Lake City PD showed the way with the Trolley Square massacre, immediately storming the building with the first three patrolmen that arrived on site. ALL Utah officers have carbines in their cars and have trained to engage instantly rather than wait for an hour for SWAT to arrive. Seconds count.
The off-duty Ogden officer in the mall ran to the gunfire and engaged the gunman ASAP, saving countless lives. As soon as his first .45 ACP slug whizzed past Goofy’s head, the massacre was OVER. While the off-duty officer never hit the gunman, it put him on defense and no more citizens were harmed. Officer Hammond only had 8 rounds on his person…the magazine in his pistol- no spare magazines…so he had to nurse those few rounds for 7 long minutes until the cavalry arrived. He was out of ammunition when patrol officers arrived on scene and took over.
Those of us who carry need to evaluate just how long we want to stay in the fight if we are caught in a similar situation.
As for BSO, they’re pretenders and cowards, all. The four stars on the doofus rankled me the first time I saw him on the news.

Columbine led to a change in doctrine. The Columbine response was treated like a hostage situation (secure perimeter, wait for assault team to go in), and the responding agencies couldn’t communicate with each other. Now, police doctrine is to go in immediately with whoever shows up. Police learned from changing threats. Similarly, the 9/11 hijackings taught the public that they need to actively attack the hijackers instead of sitting idle and enduring a detour to Cuba or a wait on the tarmac while negotiations go on.

Ultimately he either failed to properly train his people or failed to properly hire and assign them. Either way, he should have resigned immediately after it became clear that it wasn’t just one bad apple that refused to go in the school.